Gang member’s fate pleases L.B. officials
Gang member’s fate pleases L.B. officials
Crime: Conviction of Crip Andre Copeland comes on heels of latest violence.
By Wendy Thomas Russell
Staff writer Long Beach Press Telegram
LONG BEACH .Oct. 22, 3003- As Long Beach police continued to hunt for the man who gunned Andre Copeland down a Marine corporal and his friend over the weekend, authorities on Wednesday quietly celebrated the conviction of Andre Copeland, a gang member responsible for two murders and a string of shootings in North Long Beach last summer.
Copeland, 19, was found guilty of two counts of murder, six counts of attempted murder and five counts of assault with a firearm Tuesday in connection with five shootings between May and July 2002. A prosecutor called Copeland “Public Enemy No. 1 in Long Beach’ and, earlier this year, a Long Beach judge equated him to a serial killer.
“He was responsible for a lot,’ Long Beach Police Detective Bob Erickson said Wednesday. “Had he not been arrested and taken off the streets, I don’t think what he was doing would have stopped. Between then and now, who knows what would have happened?’
Certainly, Copeland’s arrest and conviction were bright spots in the LBPD’s ongoing battle against local gangs. Last summer saw a spate of gang-related shootings, assaults and murders, primarily in the north and central areas of Long Beach.
But the violence continues. Early Sunday morning, Marine Cpl. Sok Khak Ung and his friend Vouthy Tho were shot to death as they attended a barbecue near Seventh Street and Orange Avenue in Central Long Beach. Ung had recently returned from the war in Iraq, where he was injured and awarded the Purple Heart.
Neither man was involved in gangs, but the barbecue at Ung’s family’s home was in the middle of Hispanic gang territory, and police suspect a gang member may be responsible.
Similarly, Copeland’s murder victims Luciano Ramirez and Paul Griego Jr. were simply at the wrong places at the wrong times, authorities said. Ramirez, 18, was attending a Lakewood High School graduation party May 31, 2002, in the 5800 block of Orange Avenue when Copeland opened fire on him and four of his friends. Griego, 17, was buying a used car in the 6000 block of Cherry Avenue July 6, 2002, when Copeland shot him and the car’s owner.
Coincidentally, Griego and Copeland both Long Beach residents shared the same birthday: July 19, 1984.
Copeland, a member of a Crips gang, chose many of his targets based on their skin color, Deputy District Attorney Ken Lynch said. Most of Copeland’s victims were Hispanic, Lynch said, and Crips gangs notoriously oppose Hispanic gangs.
The last of Copeland’s shooting victims Misael Espinoza was shot in the head in the 200 block of Norton Street while walking on the sidewalk. Espinoza lost an eye in the attack, and his head was left deformed, Lynch said, but he lived to identify his attacker in court.
Copeland was 17 when he was arrested. He was tried as an adult, however, and now faces a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole when he is sentenced Nov. 13 by Long Beach Superior Court Judge Charles Shel
